Do Not Disturb
by Higurazel
Summary: Here we are, a short spiritshipping piece as my first entry for the site! Anzu takes a trip to a certain spirit room during the Battle City finals.


Yugi stepped over the pile of discarded clothes that formed misshapen hills and valleys over the living room floor.

"You in here Joey?" He called out, his voice a little shakey as he felt his foot trample something soft and warm. It gave way under his tread with the squelch of dried sauce and the crumple of a plastic tub. The boy shuddered, looking about for his friend somewhere within the pile of debris.

A groan and a grumble preceded a cascade of old clothes and junk food wrappers from the couch, a mess of blonde hair raising up, slick and covering Joey's face as he slowly, painfully started to wake up. One hand snapped up to hold his head, a hollow striking noise thudding around the room as the glass bottle his finger had been stuck in crashed into the top of his skull. Yugi winced as his friend folded up and grumbled in pain to himself.

"It was a hell of a night then?" he asked, smiling warmly, hopelessly and starting to shift collections of junk to the side of the couch to give Joey room to move.

_-oo move..._

"Thanks Yug," Joey said, his voice a hoarse, coarse whisper as he blinked away the spots in his vision. "I guess I fell behind on keeping this place in order." He shrugged and gave a grin as he disappeared into the kitchen, piling a bundle of sheets into the washing machine, kicking them viciously to make them fit.

Yugi started picking up various tins and packets, depositing them in a black garbage bag and intermittently wiping his hands on his jacket.

"Joey, what's this?" He called out to the kitchen, poking a clear plastic tub that contained a pale, bulging lump of matter. Joey's head popped into view from the doorframe, squinting at the tub.

"Oh, that's just leftovers from the Chinese New Year party."

There was a long period of stillness and silence.

"Joey... Chinese New Year was a month ago."

Joey's face creased up. He looked as though he were thinking hard. Eventually he sighed,

"I guess you probably shouldn't eat it then..." He disappeared back to his sheet-kicking.

Yugi sucked in a long breath, picking the tub up and throwing it into the bag as quickly as he could, lest the pale lump try to communicate with him. It gave a distinct wet noise as it struck the bottom of the bag, turning Yugi's stomach even further. He turned his attention to the next piece of clutter that had set up shop on Joey's coffee table.

Beneath it, a glimmer of silver dazzled Yugi, sticking out from the rest of the table's pallette of grey's, green's and ochre's. The boy dropped the trash into the bag, slowly reaching out and pulling on the silver item, dragging more of it into view. A picture frame, face down. Yugi's brow arched as he freed it from under a small mountain of drink cans, flipping it face up as he did so.

Serenity's warming gaze looked up at him from the confines of the silver frame, the slightest hint of a smile at the corners of her lips, a sparkle in her eyes disguising the tragedy of her blindess. Yugi smiled back at the photo, sadness welling up as-

There was a loud crack. Fine white lines arching through the picture frame, lightning bolts through the silver decoration. Before Yugi could drop the thing, it split into a hundred thousand fragments, each coming to a cruel, curved point. They sparked forwards through the air, screaming towards the boy's face, hanging in mid-flight millimetres from him. He could see every last point, finely honed, sharper than anything made by man, all pointed toward the wet softness of his eyes.

His whole body was frozen.

Couldn't turn away.

Couldn't shut his eyes.

The moment passed.

A hundred thousand needles of lightning pain rushed excitedly into the embrace of his pupils.

_-upils..._

Yami opened his eyes, sucking in a panicked breath as he awoke. Sheets were coiled around his nude form, heavy with cold perspiration and constricting his legs tightly. He tried to get his breathing under control, fumbling for the switch to his lamp, flicking it on and illuminating his apartment. He blinked rapidly, staring up at the ceiling and calming himself. Just a nightmare. He needed to relax. Any extra stress wasn't going to help matters. He glanced over at his bedside clock.

1 A.M.

He groaned. Still plenty of time before morning. Time to go back to sleep.

He flicked off the lamp, closing his eyes and trying to convince himself the nightmare wouldn't revisit. He felt fatigue take to his body surprisingly quickly, sleep taking its hold on him faster than he was expecting. In the instant before he became truly dead to the world, he could have sworn he felt a weight press against the mattress to his side, and a familiar perfume seep into his nostrils. But then it was gone.

He was back in the arms of sleep.

_-of sleep..._

Yami's hand tightened around Serenity's, taking on a more protective role, rather than just guiding.

"We're coming up on some stairs now," He told her, taking the sandy blocks slowly until they reached the platform of carved rock that sat at this level of the former Pharaoh's soul-room. The girl almost stumbled on the final step, but a strong arm encircled her shoulders, keeping her upright and guiding her to the destination. Yami grinned as he saw the blood rush to his companion's cheeks, her blush readily apparent just below the crisp white of the bandages around her eyes.

He took the bag from off his shoulder, setting it down on the ground and unfurling the blanket onto the dusty rock, taking Serenity's arm and guiding her to her seat.

"You didn't have to go to all this trouble..." She said, quietly, stopping and smiling as she listened to the whispers echoing.

"Fine thing to say when the picnic was your idea," Yami chuckled, teasing her as he unpacked the contents of the satchel.

Serenity smiled, sighing gently, "I know, but I wasn't expecting you to pick somewhere like..." She trailed off.

"Very few people get to come here," he admitted, "And even fewer get the guided tour. This is something special for me."

"I'm honoured," she giggled, taking up the glass that was handed to her. "Still, I wish I could see it. It sounds amazing."

"Sounds?" Yami rummaged through the bag, digging out his own glass.

"Mmhmm," Serenity nodded, looking more at ease by the second. "The echoes. It sounds big. Grand. Y'know?"

Yami chuckled again, "Yes, big is definitely the keyword. Easy to get lost in-" he caught himself, knowing that such a line of conversation probably wouldn't make a great impression. "Of course, you've got me as a guide, so don't worry about any of that." His chuckle became a little more nervous, his hand slipping and fumbling around the glass. It tumbled to the blanket and rolled away, down the sandstone blocks they had just ascended.

"What was that?" Serenity turned her head.

"That was me being a klutz." He admitted, getting himself to his feet. "I'll be right back."

He could see her tense up. Not surprising since he'd just told her the only reason she shouldn't be worried was that he was around, right before he had to disappear. Even if it was just for a few seconds. He placed a hand on her shoulder. "Don't fret," he told her, squeezing, "I'm not going anywhere."

Without thinking it through, he leant in and pressed a kiss against her cheek. He had already pulled up and started down the stairs before it settled in his mind what he had just done. His face burned and his temples pounded. Why had he done that? That could have just been the death-knell for a potentially nice evening. A lovely picnic. No villains, no end-of-world events. Just dinner with a cute girl (who happened to be Joey's little sister). Oh Ra... He swallowed. He'd have to apologise once he got back. And then think of some way of skirting around what he had done when he next spoke to Joey.

He reached the bottom of the steps, turning back as he stooped to pick up the glass. Serenity hadn't moved. He stopped for the moment, watching her. He murmured under his breath. Maybe it wasn't such a big shock that he had kissed her. Maybe-

His hand closed around the glass, his fingers tracing a small groove in the floor. He turned back just in time to see the tip of his index finger slide against a tiny switch in the stone floor. No longer a dream. He was reliving a memory. The same memory he had relived a hundred times these past few years. Every time it ended the same way. There was no way to change the course of events, no matter how hard he tried to remember it as a happy ending. The switch depressed.

No.

A loud click echoed around the chamber, a loud hiss of ancient air erupting from a wall somewhere in the darkness. Absolute terror coursed through Yami's veins, adrenaline pounding through his body as he jerked to his feet. He turned and began to rush up the stairs. He had to get Serenity out of here. His eyes fixed on her. Crimson hair swaying as her head turned every which way, trying to figure out what was going on. She was calling out for him.

Seconds dragged out into endless hell. Yami was two steps from the top, reaching out his hand. His fingers were inches from her shoulder. Another loud click. The floor beneath her gave way, blocks sliding into place and forming a chute that snaked its way down into the deepest bowels of the Soul Room labyrinth. Screaming, Serenity slid down the chute, becoming wrapped up in the picnic basket as everything tumbled down into the blackness.

Yami reached the apex of the stairs.

An iron grating slid into place over the hole above the chute, slamming into place with a brutal, final locking noise. It set in place and became as permanent and immovable as the rocks that made up the walls of this endless dimension. Yami's fingers interlaced with the iron, tightening around it, cutting his skin open on the black metal as he screamed out for the chasm to give Serenity back.

Her screams grew quieter and quieter, fading into the background silence of the labyrinth. No matter how much longer she fell down the chute for, she would be deposited somewhere inside the nightmarish maze. To find one's way out of there was a hopeless prospect for anyone, even if they had their sight. Yami screamed out in rage and frustration, the joints of his fingers cut down to the bone in his attempts to reach out through the grating.

Soon enough it was just the two of them left in the Soul Room. The former Pharaoh, and the ceaselessly bouncing echoes of screams and shouts as they bounded over the walls.

Within time, even they disappeared too.

_-eared too..._

He awoke once again. No heavy, frantic breathing this time. It was a familiar nightmare. It no longer left any panic in his body, just a deep hopelessness.

He felt strange as he picked himself up into a sitting position. His lips felt slick and puffy. In fact his entire body seemed as though it were puffed full of air.

Numb.

Weightless.

He licked his lips, noting the lack of sensation. There was an aroma clinging to the air. Clinical. Clean. Medical...

He reached for the switch to his lamp, flicking it on.

The room was still swathed in darkness. Ra-damned bulb must have gone. He looked across to his clock, seeing nothing.

Literally seeing nothing. No bright digital numbers facing out at him, just a wall of black. He could hear birds chattering in the distance. It must be morning. Where were the early rays of sunlight? The orange and pink heralds that he often tried to escape from to catch up on some more sleep. His hands raised to his face, feeling the cold, congealed thickness of liquid drying on his cheeks. They raised higher, tentatively touching around the ruined holes of his eyesockets, open wounds from a savage surgeon.

A few footsteps and his apartment door opened and slammed shut. Someone running down the stairs and leaving the building.

"Hello?" Yami called out, running his fingers together, trying to piece together what was happening as his brain started to come back to full power.

Within a few seconds, the anaesthetic started to wear off.

Soon enough, Yami's screams began to echo off the walls.


End file.
